Bye Baby Bunting
by Jac Danvers
Summary: Kate Austen has always done what was best for herself. Roger Linus just wants his son to survive. The aftermath of Kate's decision in "Whatever Happened, Happened" and what happens when she returns to the Dharma Initiative.


**Disclaimer: I do not own Lost, nor do I own any of the characters associated with it. Bye Baby Bunting is a traditional nursery rhyme.  
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* * *

"Phil, I wanna see her. Let me through, damnit!" From behind the thick steel bars of the security station's jail cell, Kate could hear Roger's shouting echoing against the concrete walls.

"You can't be here Roger, LaFleur hasn't interrogated her yet. Once we get all the information we need out of her, then you can scream all you want. But not until we have what we need. Unless you'd prefer not to see your son again!"

At those words, Roger fell silent, and Kate covered her face with her hands in an attempt to prevent her sobs from being heard. Roger's 'preference' as to whether he'd ever see his son again didn't really matter now, did it? Kate had made sure of that the moment she forced Sawyer to pass the boy's limp body over to Alpert.

Was it what was best for Ben? No- he was about to turn into the monster that Kate had met thirty years in the future. Perhaps it was best for Roger, who'd been kind enough to help her at the motor pool? No, it wasn't that either.

It was what was best for Kate. She would have felt guilty if the boy had died, and she just couldn't deal with one more piece of guilt added to her conscious.

Unfortunately, now she felt even guiltier.

Just like with Aaron, with her father, with everything else in her life, Kate's actions were always what she thought was best for her, not taking into account anyone else around her. And just like last time, she was sitting alone in a prison, waiting for fate to damn her all over again.

In the foyer, she heard the security station's door open and slam shut. Two heavy feet smashed against the steps as they jogged downstairs.

"Phil, we need you. Possible security breach out in the fourth quadrant."

Miles. Oh how she wanted to kick him in this moment. Phil was the only thing preventing Roger from unlocking the prison door and strangling her. She knew if it was Aaron that had been surreptitiously kidnapped and handed over to Richard Alpert, that's what she'd do to the perpetrator. Once Phil was gone, she'd have to face an angry father's wrath. It was no secret that Roger had little control over his rage.

"Is it my boy, Miles?" she heard Roger ask.

There was no answer, and Kate imagined Miles had just given one of his noncommittal shrugs. "C'mon Phil, we gotta get going. LaFleur'll be pissed if we don't high tail it over there."

_You did what was best… _she reminded herself, trying to hold back tears of anger, of frustration, of sheer hopelessness that resulted from everything that had happened since she boarded Flight 815. _Yeah, what was best for yourself_, another voice in her head threw back.

Shit, she'd fucked it all up again, hadn't she?

O O O

_Twelve Hours Earlier_

_Kate emerged from the jungle, her mind racing through everything she had just done and just witnessed. Ben would be alright. He would be safe with Richard. Her trouble now was finding a way back into camp without arousing any suspicion. Not to mention having a viable reason as to why little Ben had disappeared from the hospital without any mention of a truce violation._

_Dozens of lies came to mind- lies that would cover their tracks perfectly. But how many more lies would they be able to keep straight? Her entire existence had come to be one lie. There was only one choice._

"_Kate…" she heard Sawyer start behind her._

_"You need to arrest me," she stated, not giving a damn that she'd interrupted him. _

_"What the hell Freckles?" he asked, the shock at her demand evident in his voice. "You finally gone off the deep edge? I just risked my ass carrying that little boy into the woods and handed him over the Hostiles, and now you want me to arrest you? Is this some kind of joke?"_

_She turned to face him, eyes carefully watching to ensure that they were not seen by anyone. Kate couldn't believe she was doing this- she was giving up her freedom by her own choice. _

_"You are going to arrest me. You are going to tell Horace or whoever the hell is in charge that you caught me walking out of the woods. There was blood in the van and blood on my shirt from Ben. You will tell them I'm a traitor, and that I admit I gave Ben to the Hostiles. And then you'll lock me up."_

_Sawyer frowned, an edge in his voice. "Why the hell would I do that?"_

_"How else are we going to protect the others, Sawyer? You've built a life here, Miles and Jin and Juliet have too. Jack and Hurley are at least blending into the community. Say you get caught now, handing over Ben to the Others… Hostiles… whoever they are! Say they find out it was Juliet's idea. Then what? They'll kill all of us. Everything you've worked for will be destroyed. We'll never get back to our own time; never find Claire or Rose or Sun, or anyone else. Don't you see?"_

_For the first time since Kate had returned to the island, Sawyer looked unsure, hesitant. "Juliet ain't gonna like that. Neither is the Doc."_

_"Fuck what they like. That's what has to happen if you're going to keep this charade up."_

_Kate felt her stomach drop. He was protesting too much. He wasn't going to do it. Sawyer was going to destroy everything. _

_Then, without warning, he roughly tossed her in the back of the van. As he sat in the driver's seat of the dharma van, he spoke into the radio. "We have a traitor in quadrant one. I'm bringing her back to the security station."_

O O O

The door of the station slammed shut again, and Kate knew it was just her and Roger now. Moments later he emerged around the corner into the darkened room. His long hair was unkempt and greasy, and his eyes were rimmed with dark circles, clear signs he'd had no rest since Ben had been injured. He was hunched over; hands deep in his pocket, but Kate could tell that his fists were clenched. He was trying to control his temper.

"Where's my son?" he asked, his voice low and steady.

Kate stood behind the bars, attempting to keep her face straight and unfeeling. "I brought him to Richard Alpert. To the Hostiles."

He looked at her incredulously, and she imagined he was thinking of the woman he'd met two nights ago who'd helped him move the flaming Dharma van from the house. No one would have suspected that she was capable of turning to the enemy for aid. "Why?"

Kate didn't respond, looking at the damp, uneven concrete floor. She didn't want to face him, didn't want to admit why she so desperately needed to save Ben. Five minutes passed, then seven, then-

Her face connected with the steel bars of the cell, smashing against her forehead, and into her teeth. She tasted blood in her mouth as Roger kept a firm grip on her shirt, preventing her from retreating into the jail cell. "WHY'D YOU GIVE MY BOY TO THE HOSTILES!" he screamed, anger and anguish combining into a frightening mix.

"Because… because I had to… I couldn't just let him die! He's just a kid; he deserved a chance at living. So I took my chances. I knew it was a risky, but Alpert said they could fix him!" Kate shouted, inserting her own little white lies where she deemed necessary.

"Then he'll be coming home? Alpert said he could save my son, so that means Ben is coming home, right?" Roger begged, loosening his grip on her.

_Do I tell him? _she wondered. _How do I break this to him?_

"No."

Kate expected to find her face bashed into the bars again, to feel large, sweaty hands around her neck choking her. Neither happened. Rather; she heard a long, tortured sob escape the older man's lips. His hands slid down the bars, as he crouched down on the floor. He was shaking wildly.

"Why would you do that? I'd rather have him dead than forced to live with those… those animals! He's the only thing I had left in the entire world! "

He was crying, she was crying. "I'm sorry. I couldn't let him die. I couldn't watch him when I knew he could be saved!" Kate half-begged, trying to make Roger understand. Anger, she had expected. Not this reaction.

Roger looked up, his face bright red in anger. "You selfish bitch. _YOU _felt guilty? _YOU_ couldn't live with watching him die? Didn't you think I deserved a say in what happened to _MY _son? I'd rather him die and be at peace then have to live with whoever or whatever those people are!"

"I HAD TO SAVE AARON!"

Ben. Aaron. The words had slipped out before she even realized. Roger was obviously confused. "Who's Aaron?"

"He was… well he never really was my son. But I raised him. Before I came back here, I gave him back to his grandmother. When his real mom disappeared, I took Aaron. At first it was just to protect him, but then I couldn't let him go once we were rescued from this place. I needed him. And then when we had to come back… I knew it was time. I couldn't protect him anymore. I couldn't keep him away from the family he deserved."

She slipped the picture of Aaron she carried in her pocket out, and passed it to Roger, who looked over it intently.

"Who exactly are you? And I want the truth this time, Kate," he demanded.

"What?"

"You keep saying 'when we got back here,' but before you stepped off that submarine you'd never been to this island before. You talk about being rescued from here, but the only way back off is on the same submarine. No unauthorized boats or planes come through here. And then there's this picture. What the hell is that box Aaron is sitting at?"

"That's a comput—" Kate's jaw dropped. How much had she said? How much had she revealed? She'd destroyed Sawyer's coverup in a matter of seconds because she'd opened her damn mouth.

_All because you had to do what was best for Kate… _the voice in her head screamed.

"A computer. Right. Because every family has one of those in their house." Roger laughed at his own joke.

"You're not going to believe me," Kate said. Should she tell him? At this point, why the hell not?

"Try me."

"I first came to this island after a plane crash… in 2004..." She never looked up as she revealed the entire story. Of the first night, and the pilot's death. Of their first encounters with the Others, the discovery of the tail survivors. She told him of the freighter, and the devious mercenaries, and of Alex's execution. And she spoke of the remains of Dharma, the purge.

She told Roger of his own murder, just over a decade away.

When the story died down, Kate finally dared to look up, only to see Roger staring back with the blankest expression she'd ever seen. "You think I'm crazy."

He shook his head. "No. I think you're entirely sane. It's a better explanation than the ones that have been brewing in my head."

They were silent, and Kate was just grateful that it didn't look like Roger was going to attack again.

"You know what it's like to lose your child," Roger said softly. "I never got to redeem myself in Ben's eyes. He'll always see me as the bastard that hit him, thanks to your interference. Not that it isn't true- I was right awful to him. But a man can change, and I would have tried, if it meant a few more years with my boy."

Silence again. Kate didn't want to speak, given that every time she opened her mouth it seemed she came even closer to destroying any chance the crash survivors had of ever living a semblance of a normal life again.

"I'm not going to tell Horace what you did," Roger said finally. Kate hadn't realized he'd been grappling with her fate. She didn't even know he had any influence in it.

"Thank—"

"Don't thank me yet. I'm not telling Horace, because you're going to leave camp. I'm going to release you."

Release her? Into the jungle with Alpert and the smoke monster, and whatever else existed on this island in 1977? Kate wished she'd never agreed to come back to this damned island, wished she'd run into the sonic fence instead of allowing Sawyer to arrest her.

"What? And where will I go?"

"You said Alpert would save my son? I want you to go and protect him. Stop him from growing into the man you say he's become."

Kate sighed, having already attempted twice to explain the rules of time travel that she had gleaned from Miles. "It doesn't work that way. Whatever happened has happened. I can't stop him from killing you or initiating the purge. I can't stop him from becoming evil."

"But you don't know for certain!" Roger begged desperately. "You take the word of one man, an insane man, according to what you said, on a subject that no one in all of history has any experience with it. It's worth a try! God damn it, you at least owe this to me. If I can never see my boy again, if I'm never to have the chance to show I can be the dad he needed because of your actions, then you owe it to me to do this. Save my boy from himself."

Kate stood in the middle of the cell, staring intently at the crack in the cement ceiling hoping wisdom and foresight would rain down upon her. To leave would be to abandon all those she called friend, and who had helped her to survive this long. To leave would be to lose Jack and Sawyer, the two men she loved but could never love. She would never be able to return, and likely would lose the trust of the others.

But looking at the man in front of her, the man whose grief was two times greater now than it had been this morning, she knew what she had to do. Because this was all her fault.

This wasn't something Kate was doing because it was best for Kate. This was what was best for Ben. This was what was best for Roger, the Dharma people, for Sawyer, Jack, and the rest of the survivors. It was a chance to rewrite history and save them all.

"I'll do it."

"I have your word?"

"I know how to find Alpert and his people; they're opposite the quadrant where they're searching now. Give me an hour before you report me missing, and we should be fine."

Roger nodded an affirmation as he pulled his large key chain out of his pocket. Flipping through the gold and silver and brass keys, he chose one and unlocked the door. "One hour Kate. "

"I'll keep him safe, Roger."

O O O

Four hours later, Jim LaFleur pulled open the door to the security station, disheartened that whoever had breached security earlier that day was not caught. As he knew the station was abandoned, he hoped to at least talk to Kate. They had to strategize, to plan her newest escape from danger.

However; the cell was empty, the door swinging on its hinges in the light breeze that had followed Sawyer when he entered the station. There were no keys in the slot, but that wasn't a surprise. No one on the island would be so stupid as to leave their keys behind. It wasn't the lack of prisoner, though, that truly caught his attention.

Rather; it was the small square of paper that lay face down on the floor. Picking it up, Sawyer found himself staring into the sweet, blue eyes of a little boy with blonde hair.

Aaron.

And in that moment, he knew that Kate would not be coming back.

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**So I have to say, this story is odd for me. I've never felt like I've been able to capture Kate just right, and Roger's character just intrigues me. I had this idea after watching "Whatever Happened Happened" because I was trying to figure out how Sawyer and Kate were going to cover up their actions. I wrote this in the half hour I had between two classes today, hehe. I hope you all enjoy it. Please read and review, constructive criticism is greatly appreciated!**


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